asserting that his friend had been poisoned. At first he was very bold
and confident in his manner, but he soon found that it was a very
different matter intimidating young and ignorant women and dealing with
a shrewd man of business. Under cross-examination his tale became
confused, contradictory, absurd; his malice flashed out so unmistakably
as to put all the jury on their guard, and when Agnes's sister stepped
forward and asked to be permitted to say that Mr. Farry had promised to
be silent if Agnes would consent to be his wife, a deep murmur of
indignation ran through the room, and the man knew himself defeated and
disgraced.
When Agnes was called, and came forward with her simple and unvarnished
tale, it only needed a look into her calm, sweet face to know that she
spoke the truth. She freely told of the difference she had had with her
father, and how Mr. Bunyan had warned her not to urge her own desire too
much, but to be dutiful and obedient. And her sister corroborating this
statement, and adding all she had seen of Agnes's gentle submissiveness
on her return, and another person giving testimony that John Bunyan had
a wife living, and that the idea of his wanting Agnes's hand was
nonsense, the whole of Farry's ingenious and malicious tale fell to the
ground, and he stood like one who would never lift up his head again.
"But if there be any doubt," said Agnes, looking at the coroner, "Mr.
Hatfield is here; he will make the needful examination."
"That is a question for the jury to decide," answered the coroner, with
a smile. "Let them retire, and give us their verdict."
A few minutes was all these honest men required before announcing that
death was due to natural causes; and then the coroner turned upon Farry
and with a most scathing reproof dismissed him, warning him that he had
brought himself perilously near a charge of perjury, had Agnes been a
vindictive foe.
Then when the man had slunk out like a beaten hound, he took Agnes's
hands in his, and said:
"You have been a courageous girl, my dear, in withstanding the artifices
of that wicked man. Hardly another maid so young and unprotected but
would have been intimidated into accepting his condition. What made you
so brave to withstand him?"
"I do not think I was brave," answered Agnes; "but I knew I should be
helped."
The old man smiled and patted her head.
"Perhaps that is the best kind of courage after all."
HANNAH HEWLING
The mother was stricken down with the load of her grief; it seemed to
her more than she could bear. Her two sons--her only sons--young men of
such promise, such beauty, such piety--lying in that foul prison of
Newgate, of which many horrid tales were told; lying there waiting a
trial, which all believed could only end in one way. It was well known
how fierce was the wrath of the King against all who had taken any share
in the late rebellion, and neither the youth of the offenders nor their
virtuous lives would be likely to have any effect upon the sentence
which they had brought upon themselves by their recent ill-advised act.
The mother buried her face in her hands and groaned aloud.
Those were sad and anxious days in many homes, particularly in the West
of England, where the Duke of Monmouth's rebellion had broken out, and
had been quickly quenched in fire and bloodshed.
To Mrs. Hewling it seemed a terrible visitation of Providence that her
two promising sons had been in any way mixed up in it.
"If I had only kept them with me here in England, they would have been
safe!" she moaned.
It was not very long since Mrs. Hewling had been left a widow, in
affluent circumstances indeed, but with a large family to bring up. She
had two most promising sons, Benjamin and William, the first twenty-one
and the second close upon nineteen years of age, and Benjamin's
twin-sister Hannah was a beautiful girl of much promise, who, at this
crisis of her mother's life, was acting as her chief support and helper.
There were several little sisters, scarcely more than children; but the
intermediate sons had died in infancy, and the chords of the mother's
heart seemed to twine themselves about Benjamin and William in a fashion
which made their present perilous situation a thing that could hardly be
borne by her.
And the bitterest thought of all was that had she only kept the boys
with her in London after their father's death, instead of letting them
go to Holland, to see something of the world and complete their
education, all this misery might have been spared.
Adverse as the citizens of London were to many of the methods and
opinions of the King, still there was no desire at present to get rid of
him by any violent revolution, or to place the crown upon another head.
A few years later, and the whole nation rose in a bloodless revolt
against the man who had broken his pledges and his coronation vow, and
would have plunged England into a fierce struggle against the trammels
of Popery. But at that time things were not ripe for such a drastic
measure, nor was the Duke of Monmouth such a sovereign as the nation
could accept. But here and there where the Protestant spirit burnt more
fiercely than elsewhere, or over in Holland, where the claim of the Duke
had been more freely allowed, and where he was eagerly recruiting forces
to take with him to England, his cause seemed a righteous cause, and
inspired enthusiasm and devotion. Mrs. Hewling could not altogether
wonder that her two sons, reared in all the most ardent Puritan and
Protestant tenets of the day, should have been fired with a desire to
join the expedition, and to strive to strike a blow for their faith upon
England's shores.
And now, that ill-starred revolt having come to its tragic end, her boys
were amongst those who, having first sought flight, had since then
surrendered themselves to justice. It had been told her by friends that
they were lying in Newgate prison, and would almost immediately be sent
back whence they had come, to stand their trial at the Western Assizes,
over which the fierce and notoriously cruel Judge Jeffreys was to
preside.
So paralysed by horror was the poor mother, whose health had long been
very frail, that she had been unable herself to leave the house and seek
permission to visit her sons. And Hannah had persuaded her not to
attempt a task so much beyond her powers.
"I will go first, mother," she said. "I will go with my good
grandfather, who will gain me admission, and we will take money with us.
Money will do much within Newgate, they say, to ameliorate the condition
of the prisoners. Another day thou shalt go; but let me be the first."
So Hannah had gone under the safe-keeping of her grandfather, Mr.
Kiffin, a citizen well known and greatly respected in the town, and the
mother was awaiting their return in a fever of anxiety.
She was turning over in her bewildered brain a thousand schemes for the
preservation of her boys. But the more she pondered, the more helpless
did she become. True, she had many friends, and several possessed of
wealth and influence in the city; but these were for the most part, from
their strong Protestant and dissenting or Puritan leanings, so obnoxious
to the Court party that intervention by them would do rather harm than
good.
Her own father, Mr. Kiffin, was one of these He would have no fear in
presenting a petition; yet if such a movement on his part were
fore-ordained to failure, it would be better it should not be made.
Others more likely to obtain a hearing would probably be afraid to
intermeddle in such a matter. Those were the days in which it was none
too safe to show sympathy towards the King's enemies, or towards those
who had distinguished themselves by opposition to the Established
Church. The penalty for showing kindness to dissenters was often
extraordinarily severe; and what would it be to take a friendly interest
in youths who had been concerned in treasonable rebellion?
With despair in her heart the mother sat waiting, pondering and weeping;
longing unspeakably for the husband who was no more, and feeling the
desolation of her widowhood as she had never felt it before.
Then the door opened quietly, and a tall figure glided in wrapped from
head to foot in a long, dark cloak.
"Hannah!" cried the mother, "have you seen them?--have you seen my boys?
Oh, give me news of them! My heart is hungry!"
The girl threw back the hood which was drawn over her head, and her face
showed pale in the twilight. It was a very beautiful face, lighted by
the enthusiasm of a great love--a love that conquers fear, and sinks all
thought of self in devotion to the object at heart. It was such a face
as we see sometimes on painted window, or in chiselled marble--a face
full of lofty self-abnegation and simple heroism. The eyes shone like
stars, and the mother, looking at her daughter, held out her arms, and
cried:
"Ah, Hannah, Hannah, if any can save them it will be thou."
Hannah knelt at her mother's feet and spoke quietly and rapidly.
"I have seen them, mother. They were together, with many others. But my
grandfather had them taken out and brought into a separate room, where
we could talk. It was a dreadful place, that first,"--she shivered
slightly as she spoke,--"but they will not go back to it. Grandfather is
staying, and he will arrange all that. I saw them. Oh, mother, you need
not fear for them! They have no fear for themselves. They are ready for
the worst that may befall. Their only fear is lest they were wrong in
taking up arms. When they did it, it seemed a right and holy thing. They
have heard other things since coming to England, and are the less
confident of that. But they have no other fear. If they have done amiss
they are willing to die. They both say that. It is not death that can
affright them. They have made their peace with God."
The mother's tears ran over, although there was something of joy in
hearing such an assurance.
"But we must save them, daughter!--we must save them!"
"We will try," answered Hannah steadily, yet without the brightness of
hope in her eyes. "We will leave no stone unturned. We will accomplish
what can be accomplished. But----"
The last word was little more than a sigh. It was not meant to reach her
mother's ears, yet it did: and Mrs. Hewling exclaimed:
"But what, daughter, but what? What hast thou heard more?"
"I have heard nought that we have not been told before; only, mother
mine, when the grim walls of a prison are about one, and grim gaolers
are talking with that cool certainty of things they have grown familiar
with, the horrible reality seems to come over one like a flood; and the
awful doom comes ever nearer and nearer. The boys have heard much--the
implacable temper of the King; his bloodthirsty mood; his choice of the
Judge who is to arraign them. In Newgate it is whispered that there will
be such a slaughter in the West as has not been heard of in this land. I
felt myself shaking all over at the things I heard there. Oh, I fear for
my brothers, I fear, I fear!"
The mother clasped her in her arms, and they mingled their tears
together. Hannah told in broken words of all that she had gleaned from
her brothers, of what they had dared and done, how they looked, how
they had stood the journey and the prison; and how they were soon to be
sent down to the West Country, to be tried at those places where they
had been seen in arms against the King.
"That is the worst of it!" cried the mother. "Had it been here in London
town our friends and the influence of our party might have had weight.
But over yonder--so far away! Ah, if I could but go there with them!"
"Mother, I will go!" said Hannah, speaking firmly and resolutely. "I
have thought of it all the way home. I have plans of all sorts in my
head. Grandfather will soon be here, and then he will tell you more, and
we will talk it over together. But I must be there. I must go with them.
I must--I must!"
"But, my child, my child, how can I spare thee? They say that the King
is so incensed that even to show pity for the condemned--for the
prisoners--is accounted as a crime. Suppose that hurt were to befall
thee?"
"Mother," she answered gently, "God can protect me, and I think He will.
But be that as it may, I cannot let my brothers go to what may be their
death alone. I must be there to visit them in their prison, to lighten
the rigours of captivity, to provide them with whatever may be permitted
in the way of defence; to cheer and strengthen them (if so it must be)
upon the very scaffold itself. Benjamin is as my second self. I could
not be other than at his side. Oh, my brother--my brother!"
A rush of tears choked her voice; she sobbed upon her mother's breast;
but the outbreak relieved the overcharged heart, and when her
grandfather appeared she was the same calm, resolute maiden she had
shown herself in the public streets, and in the dim retreats of the
dreadful gaol.
Mr. Kiffin had made arrangements for the better lodging and treatment of
his grandsons during their brief detention in Newgate; but he had heard
that almost immediately they were to be sent west to be ready to stand
their trial with others at the coming Assizes; and at the very name of
these the mother's cheek paled.
"Yes, it is a terrible thought--the power that will be placed in the
hands of one man--and he one noted for ferocity of temper and gross
injustice to those who are brought before him. It is known too that the
King has selected him for these very qualities to fill the dreadful
office which will be his. Yet for our poor lads there may be this one
chance: his cruelty is only rivalled by his greed of money; and we may
appeal to his cupidity where we should appeal in vain to his clemency."
"Must we then offer him a bribe?" asked Mrs. Hewling, with a faint
distaste in her tone, as though even with her sons' lives at stake, the
thought of buying justice or mercy with gold had in it something
repulsive to her better nature. Hannah's beautiful eyes were likewise
turned upon her grandfather questioningly. It was an age when all sorts
of things were bought and sold for hard cash, that never should have
been so trafficked for; but in the stern Puritan tenets in which this
family had been reared any sort of illicit bartering was strongly
condemned.
"I did not mean exactly that; but yet we may perhaps move him through
his love of money. You have both heard me speak of my old friend and
fellow-citizen, with whom in past days I lived a long while, working
with him as a brother might," and he named a name that was familiar to
both mother and daughter.
"Well, strange as it may seem, the young barrister, now made a judge,
this violent, bloodthirsty Jeffreys, is my old friend's kinsman, and, in
fact, his next-of-kin. I had forgotten the fact, if indeed I ever knew
it, till I had a letter from him a few days since reminding me of it,
and asking if there was anything that he could do to aid us in our
trouble. I have seen him, and he has promised to use every means in his
power to gain the leniency of the Judge for our two dear lads. It is
unluckily true that they have taken up arms against the King. It cannot
but be proved against them, nor will they seek to deny it. By the law of
the land they have merited death, and may even be condemned to suffer
the full penalty. But as my friend informs me, out of the hundreds who
will undergo sentence, not a few will escape the dread final penalty.
Even the King in all his ferocity will not dare to slay by thousands,
though he may by hundreds. Many will be condemned to death, who will
afterwards be respited and undergo lighter sentences, or be let off with
a heavy fine. In this matter the voice of the Judge will have weight;
and my friend will use every argument to induce him to commute the death
penalty (if passed upon Benjamin or William) into one that a heavy fine
will cover."
Mother and daughter seemed to breathe more freely; and Hannah unfolded
her plan of going herself to Lyme Regis and Taunton, the places to which
her brothers were to be taken--she knew not exactly whither they were to
be sent--that she might minister to them in every possible way, cheer
and strengthen them in their hour of trial, and be there to forward any
suit that might be made on their behalf.
"There will be peril in such a mission, granddaughter," said the old
man. "Many a gentle-hearted woman has suffered grievously for doing less
than thou dost propose to do."
"I shall suffer more by staying away," said Hannah simply. "I must go.
Something within me bids me. I cannot hold back. Thou wilt be here to
care for mother and the little ones. I must be with my brothers."
They did not try to hold her back. Her heart was set upon the sorrowful
journey, and the mother, in her yearning over her boys, was ready to
speed her upon her way. She had money, as much as she could use for
every possible purpose, and letters to friends of their friends in the
West Country, who would show her kindness and help her in her difficult
task. Mr. Kiffin would have accompanied her, but that his daughter
seemed to require him more, and he was something too infirm easily to
endure the long, rough journey. But he sent two of his experienced
servants with Hannah; and the journey was made easy to her in every
possible way, albeit in her present mood she would almost have welcomed
hardship and privation. What might not her brothers be suffering of
both?
She found that they had been conveyed to Taunton, and lodged in the
castle there. The building was densely crowded at this time; for the
dread Judge was on his way, and the friends of the prisoners were in a
terrible state of agitation and fear. Stories were flying from mouth to
mouth of what the inhuman Judge had done and said at Winchester, and
how he had condemned the aged and virtuous Lady Lisle to be burnt to
death for no greater sin than that of harbouring some unhappy wretch,
who had fallen beneath the King's ban. What hope was there for any here?
But through the influence of those who cared for her, Hannah obtained
the grace of an interview with her brothers on the eve of their trial,
and found them calm and resigned. It was keen joy to them to embrace
their sister again, to give their last messages (as they thought they
might be) to all the loved ones at home, and to know how much they were
thought of and prayed for by many far and near. But they had no hope of
mercy. They had heard of the implacable nature of the Judge, and were
aware that their very wealth and importance, in one sense of the word,
would be against them. Obscure persons might be respited, and those
perhaps of noble blood; but not those whose fame came from their
resolute adherence to precepts civil and religious that were abhorred of
King James and his Court.
It was a fearful moment for Hannah when she was passed into that close
and crowded Court upon the momentous day, and saw the red and bloated
face of the Judge and his bloodshot eyes glaring at the prisoners, as a
wolf glares at the victims he is about to spring upon and devour. What
need to talk of that trial?--it was the veriest travesty of justice ever
known. The prisoners were bidden if they desired mercy to plead guilty,
and as soon as they had done so were sentenced to a traitor's doom in
one solid mass. Respite would come later for some, that was partly
understood; but whenever some special plea was put forward for an
individual who had friend or counsel to speak for him, the fury of the
Judge rose to a fearful pitch, and he roared down the voice of the
defender, rolling his eyes and swearing with such hideous vehemence that
soon none dared lift up a voice in his presence, and Hannah was
supported half fainting from the Court, where she had heard both her
brothers condemned to death.
But even then her courage did not desert her, and terrible as was the
aspect of the Judge, and awful as were the things spoken of him, she
resolved to place herself in his way as he came forth, and plead for the
lives of her brothers, as the one last faint hope still remaining to
her.
Alas! she might as well have sought mercy from the flinty rock, or the
sea breaking in merciless fury. The bloated, evil face was turned upon
her in savage fury. The Judge plucked his robe out of her detaining
hand, and flung himself into his coach crying out:
[Illustration: The Judge plucked his robe out of her detaining hand.
_Page 310._]
"Madam, your brothers are a pair of pestilent rogues, who come from a
pestilent nest of dissenters. I would I had the power to send you to the
gallows with them! That is the only place for a cursed brood like
yours!"
And as Hannah, fired by wrath and by her sisterly despair, would not
even then be silenced, but continued her petition with her hands upon
the window frame of his coach, he leaned out upon the other side and
roared to his charioteer to cut at that pestilent woman with his whip;
and the lash drew blood from Hannah's white fingers as she sank half
fainting into the arms of her friends.
And yet that very evening, to her immense astonishment, she received a
courteous summons to the presence of the Judge, and on presenting
herself at his lodging in the castle, with the friend in whose care she
was at that time living, she found Jeffreys in an extraordinarily
different mood. He had, in fact, just made the discovery that the woman
he had treated so brutally was one of the family specially recommended
to him by his relative, who had said that the ultimate benefits he might
expect from him would largely depend on what efforts he made to save the
two Hewling brothers. If the Judge had not been so drunk overnight when
this missive reached him, he might possibly have acted differently in
Court that day; but now he assured Hannah that he would do all in his
power to obtain a respite of the capital sentence for her brothers,
though he implied that this might be an affair of money, and practically
demanded three hundred pounds for his services, which Hannah in her
bewilderment and by the advice of her friend was ready to pay.
But the days dragged on and no message came from the King. The gentle
William, who had been sentenced to die at Lyme Regis almost immediately
after his trial, met his doom upon the scaffold with unflinching
fortitude, and all the grace his sister could obtain was that she might
take possession of the unmutilated body, which was interred in
consecrated ground, two hundred brave young maidens of the place
incurring the possible displeasure of the King by walking in white robes
at his funeral, and singing hymns over his grave.
But Hannah had no time for vain lamentations. The fire of despair was in
her heart. Benjamin yet lived. He was not to die till the last day of
the month. There was yet time to plead for him. She knew not whether
Judge Jeffreys had been true to his promise or no; but at least she, his
sister, would strain every nerve, would know no rest day or night till
she had obtained his pardon, even though she should have to seek it from
the King himself.
In vain her friends warned her of the uselessness and peril of her task;
go she would, and as fast as horse could speed her. And with the last
touching letter from her brother William in her pocket, and the scene
of his death photographed upon her memory, she posted to London, to
achieve what all men told her was impossible.
She scarcely paused to mingle her tears with her mother's. A fever was
in her heart. Her grandfather had influence enough to obtain for her
admission to the palace, and there she was met and kindly spoken to by a
gentleman, whose name she knew not at the time, but who was no other
than Lord Churchill, afterwards the great Duke of Marlborough.
Churchill regarded her with a look of exceeding compassion; Hannah
presented indeed a touching picture in her girl's grief and sisterly
devotion; and her unusual beauty had not been dimmed by all the troubles
through which she had passed. Something of her story was known even at
Whitehall, and known also was the character of the merciless man before
whom her brothers had been tried, and the merciless monarch who had sent
him forth to this work.
"Madam," said Lord Churchill, as the summons came for Hannah to be
received by the King, and as he spoke he laid his hand upon the marble
of the carved mantelpiece upon which he leaned, "my wishes for success
go with you, and my most hearty sorrow for your distress; yet I dare not
speak any word of hope to buoy up your sinking spirits; for this marble
is not harder nor more susceptible of compassion than is the heart of
the King."
Poor Hannah was destined to find it so. She was received with cold
looks; her petition, so carefully worded and drawn up, was scarcely
looked at before the King flung it down, and threw a curt heartless
refusal at her.
She was hurried away by the attendants, who, though commiserating her
grief and innocence, felt that she only ran a needless risk of drawing
down the royal wrath upon herself.